Study's jobs claim debated

Wednesday

Feb 27, 2013 at 12:01 AM

Building twin tunnels in the Delta and converting working farms to fish habitat will create more jobs than are destroyed, according to the latest study commissioned by the state agency pursuing the project.

Alex Breitler

Building twin tunnels in the Delta and converting working farms to fish habitat will create more jobs than are destroyed, according to the latest study commissioned by the state agency pursuing the project.

Economist David Sunding, with the consulting firm The Brattle Group, found that the tunnels and habitat work would result in more than 136,000 jobs over half a century, most of them from the construction of the 40-foot-diameter tunnels.

It's not the first time large job gains have been touted in connection with the tunnels, but this time Sunding also examined habitat restoration benefits and compared those gains with job losses as Delta farmland is taken out of production.

The end result is a "positive and large" surge in employment, he reported.

One Delta economist, however, said Tuesday that the study is too narrow.

The University of the Pacific's Jeff Michael, who has frequently been critical of the state's analysis of the tunnels plan, said the study fails to look at job impacts under other alternatives.

For example, Delta advocates have called for strengthening levees, but the state has not evaluated how many jobs that alternative might create.

"The study doesn't look at jobs lost by the $14 billion pulled out of people's wallets to pay for this thing (the tunnels)," Michael said. "That's the net impact you have to look at.

"It's just frustrating to me because a report like this adds no value to the question of whether or not this is a good project that the state should do," Michael said. "It's strictly a promotional piece so they can try to reduce the opposition."

Most of the jobs would be generated during the first 30 years of the plan, as the tunnels are built and the habitat created, Sunding found. Years 30 through 50 might see a slight decline in employment as construction slows down and farmland is retired.

Sunding argues, however, that the nearer-term numbers are more reliable than projections for decades down the road. His study says the cumulative effect over 50 years will be positive.

His study does not look further into the future.

Water users supporting the plan pointed to Sunding's study as evidence that Delta communities can coexist with the controversial projects. "As the Delta evolves, so can the local economy," State Water Contractors General Manager Terry Erlewine said in a prepared statement.